SWRCB to Hear Proposal on Increasing Unimpaired Flows in the Delta

The California State Water Resources Control Board (SWRCB) will look at a proposal next week that seeks to update the Bay-Delta Water Quality Control Plan under California’s Porter-Cologne Act.
The proposal, which is opposed by American Pistachio Growers, seeks to require an average of 40% of “unimpaired flows” along the Merced, Tuolumne, and Stanislaus Rivers.

The proposal, which is being pushed as necessary to protect fish, will impose a very high cost on rural communities, farmers and other people while providing little or no benefit to fish. By taking away more surface water options, farmers in the Central Valley will be forced to pump more groundwater from aquifers, in direct conflict with the goals of the Sustainable Groundwater Management Plan. American Pistachio Growers is a co-signer to a letter of opposition that was submitted to the SWRCB by the California Farm Bureau Federation.